The role of dehumanization in genocide

A short thread 🧵 1/

Recent research has advanced understanding of why people participate in genocide. 2/ Influences like peer pressure, group norms and obedience to authority often outweigh deeply held beliefs or ideologies. Class, economic inequality and lack of resources also make some individuals more vulnerable to coercion. items.ssrc.org/insights/dehum…

Zionist genocide of Indigenous Palestinians did not start on October 7, 2023, as some claim. It has been ongoing since the early 20th century.

A thread 🧵 1/ 2/ Nationalistic propaganda merges the perception of ‘self’ with that of ‘nation’ into a cohesive identity loyal to the ruling class. Zionist propaganda fused Jewish longing for safety with white supremacist, messianic and fascistic ideologies aimed at land theft.

On Project Esther: A Trumpian blueprint to crush anticolonial resistance

A thread 🧵 1/

Created by the same minds that brought us the authoritarian, Christian nationalist “Project 2025”, “Project Esther” syncretises the story of Queen Esther, 2/ the Jewish heroine celebrated during Purim for saving Jews of ancient Persia from extermination at the hands of Vizier Haman, with modern day Zionist narratives of defence and victimhood to depict her as a defender of Jews against activists, academics and progressive

To stop Zionist genocide, dismantling, deconstructing and decolonizing its propaganda is key.

Zionism relies first and foremost on a fabricated, white colonialist identity of a "new Jew," using a co-opted version of Judaism 1/ 2/ in an anti-Semitic way to justify apartheid and genocide for capitalist, colonial land grabs. As such, the notion of "Jewish supremacy" is fundamentally reactionary, misrepresenting this manufactured identity as Jewish rather than recognizing it as white colonialist.

On Netanyahu and Trump: The fascist tag team from hell

A thread 🧵 1/

In their demagoguery, corruption, racism and lack of social conscience, Trump and Netanyahu are mirror fascist images. 2/ They deploy a right-wing, ethnocentric populist appeal with dog whistles and fear-mongering to consolidate power. Operating above and outside the law, they avoid corruption trials, inhabiting the same unrestrained, tyrannical Hobbesian world.

archive.is/NWa29

On the impending crackdown on anti-genocide campus protest.

A thread 🧵 1/

As a new academic year starts and Zionist genocidal aggression continues in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon students are once again mobilising in protest. 2/ These student protesters are already facing further intimidation from university administrations, threats from political leaders, abuse from the police and unsubstantiated accusations of anti-Semitism from mainstream media. aljazeera.com/program/newsfe…

On @KamalaHarris and fortifying Black-Palestinian solidarity.

A thread 🧵 1/

Over the years, the strength of Black-Palestinian solidarity has been increasingly recognised as a threat by Israel and American Zionists.

2/ They view intersectional and anti-colonial solidarity as a threat because it challenges and dismantles divisive Zionist propaganda. see below-
reutgroup.org/Publications/n…

Israeli anti-Zionists, more so than Jewish anti-Zionists, possess a unique ability to deeply understand and articulate the experience of being fully immersed in Zionist propaganda and then dismantling it after decolonizing our minds.

A short thread 🧵 1/ 2/ Jewish anti-Zionists who are not Israeli cannot fully grasp this process - and they should be grateful for that.

The idea that Jewishness should be central (or even at the forefront) to anti-Zionism is not only ahistorical (most Zionists are Xtian), it is counterproductive.

Short reality check (8/1/24): For the past 300 days, since Oct. 7th, 2023, the Palestinian people, particularly inhabitants of Gaza but also the West Bank, have been enduring a brutal Zionist campaign of murderous violence, annihilating tens of thousands of lives,

A thread 🧵 1/ 2/ leaving countless injured, without adequate medical care, starving, and unsafe from Israel’s US-supplied bombs, even within churches, mosques, schools and hospitals. According to reports from Al Jazeera, the numbers are staggering and mounting by the hour:

Every time Netanyahu, the American furniture salesman who became Israel’s longest serving PM, speaks to congress there’s a chorus of people who promote the tail wagging the dog hypothesis. This is ahistorical, counterproductive and dangerous.

A thread 🧵 1/ 2/ It is ahistorical because Israel has always been in this position - reliant on empire, whether British or American, to sustain its white supremacist capitalist real estate project in Palestine. Nothing has changed in this regard;

Israel: Where Genocide Meets Real Estate

A thread 🧵 1/

Recently, real estate events in synagogues in Toronto, Los Angeles, and New Jersey, among other locations, have promoted property sales in Israel and the Occupied West Bank. 2/ Marketing property assets in "Anglo neighborhoods," events of this nature target Zionist Jews from the US, Canada and the rest of the English-speaking West.

realestateisrael.org

On Trumpism and Zionism

A thread 🧵1/

Antisemites and Zionists have long collaborated toward mutual interests. While the former have been interested in ridding Europe and America of Jews, the latter have worked toward moving as many Jews as possible 2/ to Israel in order to Judaize it, i.e. as a weapon against the “demographic threat” posed by native Palestinians.

There are two major classes of anti-Semites. The first is religiously grounded and views Jews as lapsed children of god

Israeli society is in turmoil. 274 days after October 7th, Israelis remain fixated on the event, despite uncovering misinformation and the Hannibal Directive, while their government and military perpetuate an unspeakable genocide against the Palestinian people.

A short 🧵1/ 2/ Liberal Zs blame "settlers", "Netanyahu", "extremism"; anyone and everyone but look inward, examine Zionism itself as a white supremacist, anti Semitic movement. Realize '48 and '67 are part of the same settler program, that all "Israel" is Palestine.

newarab.com/opinion/libera…

Liberal Zionists - Gatekeepers of genocide.

A thread 🧵

Israel’s ongoing genocide is part of a downward spiral for the Zionist project. 1/ 2/ Yet Zionism’s long-standing settler goals have not only thrived through genocidal aggression masked as “self-defence” with subsequent land grabs as obscene rewards for its adherents but also via its “liberal” flank serving a crucial propaganda role,

newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/…

On the fallacy of a "Jewish and Democratic" state as a core tenet of Zionist propaganda.

A short thread 🧵 1/

Zionism has been a white supremacist settler movement since its inception. 2/ Zionists coopted aspects of Judaism and Liberalism, repackaging them as appeals to identities and propaganda tools to bolster colonial expansion.

yakovrabkin.ca/israel-and-zio…

On "pathologizing" genocidal displays.

A thread 🧵1/

War and mass killing (genocide) are not inherent to human nature; archaeological findings indicate these behaviors emerged with the onset of imperialism. 2/ Humans are a social species, and anti-social behavior has typically been viewed as a symptom of psychopathology.

Though traditionally considered maladaptive, anti-social behaviors (eg bullying) have been reevaluated by researchers like Anthony Volk.

thedissenter.net/podcast/941-an…

Standing Together (@omdimbeyachad) has initiated a “Humanitarian Guard” in Jerusalem to protect Palestinians from aggressive settlers, predominantly from the West Bank, who aim to intimidate, lynch, or destroy businesses in cowardly acts of bullying.

A short thread 🧵1/

https://twitter.com/AlonLeeGreen/status/1798424012881830135

2/ While it is undeniably brave to stand against such violence, Standing Together fails to identify and denounce Zionism, the root cause of the issue. Without addressing Zionism, their efforts remain relatively insignificant compared to the oppressive violence perpetrated by IOF

On the Netanyahus and antisemitism

A short thread 🧵1/ 2/ The contemporary Zionist collusion with antisemites and fascists runs deep and is orchestrated by those at the very top. In fact, Zionists and the current Netanyahu regime are some of the foremost contributors to antisemitism and fascism worldwide.

Yesterday marked Israeli Independence Day, an important milestone in the Israeli psyche and an incomparable tool for Zionist/ white supremacist genocide-for-land-grab.

A thread 🧵 1/ 2/ Political, religious, military and economic elites easily manipulate behavioral manifestations associated with fear and anxiety in a populace to gain support for their aggressive policies, distract from their own inadequacies and suppress dissent.

On counter-revolutionary liberals.

A thread 🧵 1/

In addition to the collaboration between explicitly reactionary forces in the US and Israel, the continued oppression of marginalized communities hinges on the liberal bourgeois class, a group of people 2/ Martin Luther King Jr referred to as “white moderates” in his letter from Birmingham Jail. Preaching the necessity of reforms, yet serving to undermine leftist revolutionary agendas under the guise of “practicality”, these complicit moderates

africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/L…

On social media as reinforcement for displays of dominance and aggression in Zionist genocide.

Lessons from chimpanzees.

(Inspired by the work of many primatologists and behaviorists)

A thread 🧵 1/ 2/ Researchers have observed what they often term “bizarre” patterns of violence in male chimpanzees, including the disturbing acts of killing infants, biting their heads, smashing them, and pulling bones out of them.